How The Flash Broke The Green Arrow
by aapenname
Summary: Oliver has never forgiven himself for creating Prometheus. But was if he actually didn't? Barry has been carrying a secret that will irrevocably change their friendship.


Oliver stared down at William's sleeping form. Tucked into his Flash-covered bed, the boy looked peaceful, a rarity in the month since they'd been back from the island. Awake, William was still a very quiet, haunted boy who missed his mother so much the pain was almost visible. It was a pain Oliver understood having witnessed the gruesome, untimely deaths of both of his parents, but particularly his mother, Moira, who'd also been murdered by a madman intent on destroying Oliver.

Smoothing the covers one more time to assure himself that William was real and tangible, safe and sound, Oliver eased out of the room, slowly pulling the door until only a sliver of space separated the door from the frame.

It was still hard for Oliver to wrap his head around the fact that he was a father. Given the chaotic nature of his life both pre- and post-island, he'd never imagined that he would have kids. It was too dangerous. He didn't know the first thing about raising kids. He couldn't be trusted with the safety of a kid. Except now he was.

It was a joy that he'd never expected, but it was continually tainted by the feeling that he traded the lives of everyone he knew for this shot at fatherhood. How could he ever look at William and not feel guilty?

Just as Oliver flopped down on the couch downstairs, his cellphone began vibrating on the sofa table. He flung a hand behind him, fishing blindly for it until his fingers connected. He pulled it overhead and in front of his face.

 _Joe West._

Oliver frowned. While he'd given Joe his number out of an abundance of caution, the man had never called him. Despite his sympathy for Oliver's situation, Joe didn't much care for Oliver, or more specifically, Green Arrow.

"Hey, Joe. Everything okay?"

There was a long pause that made Oliver check the phone to be sure that they hadn't lost their connection. "Hey, Oliver. Um, it's… something is going on with Barry."

Oliver sat straight up, the weariness and sleepiness fading at the thought that his friend might be in trouble. "What's wrong? How can I help? You need me to head that way?"

"Uh. Actually, we think he's headed your way. Cisco's tracking him and he's zig-zagging in a pattern towards Star City. You're the only person he knows there… since the island, I mean."

Oliver closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "I'll keep an eye out for him, figure out what's going on."

"Thanks," Joe said, the relief evident in his voice. "Oh. And you should probably know, he's, uh, drunk. Completely plastered."

Oliver felt his eyebrows lift. What was going on? The Barry he knew was so straight edge it was almost Mormon-ish. "I thought Barry couldn't get drunk?"

"He couldn't but Cisco and Tracy had been tooling around on a pet project and found some kind of chemical compound that his body couldn't break down as quickly," Joe explained. "But that inability to get drunk means he doesn't have any tolerance built up. He's a danger to himself and to other if he's out there using his powers."

"Alright. Let me call Lyla, see if she can look after William and then I'll—" He was interrupted by a crash right outside his front door.

"What was that?" Joe asked.

"I don't know. Hold on." Oliver tucked the phone into his pocket, grabbed his K-bar knife and inched towards the door. He steeled himself with a few deep breaths before ripping the door open to confront—

A hammered Barry Allen crumpled on his welcome mat.

Oliver stared for a few moments, the adrenaline slowly leaking out of his system, leaving tingling in its wake. He sheathed the K-bar knife, shoved it in his back pocket, and slid his phone back out.

"Hey, I found Barry, he's here. With me."

Joe huffed a sigh of relief. "Oh, thank God. Just keep him there. I'm on my way. I'll be there in about an hour, hour and a half. "

"No. Don't worry about it. He's safe here. I'll let him sleep it off and then he can run back in the morning."

Joe hesitated. "You sure?"

"He'd do it for me."

"Alright. Tell him we'll talk in the morning."

Oliver laughed. "I'm sure he's already looking forward to it."

He hung up with Joe and considered how he was going to move Barry. Barry looked reed-thin, but he really just had a ton of runner muscle and on top of that was a million miles long, making him harder to maneuver. Oliver finally settled on a fireman's carry, taking care that Barry's freakishly long legs didn't knee or kick him in the soft bits.

Oliver muscled Barry over to the couch and lowered him with a grunt. He considered his friend for a moment, genuinely perplexed. Barry was always the happy go lucky, light hearted part of their team ups. His life hadn't been perfect by any means, but he always managed to find the silver lining in every situation.

"So what's got you swimming at the bottom of a bottle all of a sudden?" Oliver wondered.

He pushed and pulled Barry until his friend's head was on a pillow and his feet hung off the other end of the couch. He pulled off Barry's shoes so he could at least be a little comfortable, but Oliver drew the line at undressing him. Barry would just have to deal with Eau de Sweat and Regret when he woke up. Oliver moved to spread a blanket across his friend and marveled at how similar it was to trying to get William to bed after a sugar crash. Oliver smiled. Fools, drunks, and babies, in deed.

As the blanket settled, Barry stirred for the first time and his eyes slitted open. "Ollie…"

Oliver hummed. "Yeah, it's me. You made it. Still not sure why you were so determined to get here, though."

Barry struggled to sit up, nearly toppling over the edge of the couch.

"Whoa, buddy. You're not going anywhere. Apparently, Cisco and Tracy found a way to make you a little less meta and a lot more human."

Barry stared at him, his hair sticking out at odd angles. He studied Oliver in confusion for a moment before his face started to crumple and he started to cry, a little at first and then it crescendoed into harsh, heartbreaking sobs.

Oliver stared in amazement. Apparently, the world's happiest man was a sad drunk. Wow.

"Hey, buddy. You gotta calm down," Oliver said in a voice he usually reserved for William after nightmares. "You're already dehydrated. You're just going to make yourself sick."

Barry took a deep gasping breath before daring a glance at Oliver. "You should hate me. If you knew the truth, you would."

Oliver frowned. "What? Why would I hate you? You're my friend. One of the only friends I have left."

This seemed to throw Barry into deeper hysterics and Oliver genuinely worried Barry might make himself puke if he kept on like this. He looked less like a grown man in his twenties and more like a desperately loss kid who felt guilty about something he could never fix. But Barry had always had his back, had been nothing less than supportive, had even saved Oliver's life more than once.

"Barry, I don't understand. What do you think you could possibly do that would make me hate you?"

"The island… It shouldn't have happened. It's all my fault."

The words barreled through Oliver, leaving him simultaneously numb and tingling. He tried to think of what to say. "You—You can't blame yourself. You weren't even there. I struggle with feeling like it's all my fault. But in the end, Adrian made the choice that… that took everybody away."

Barry's sobs had softened to whimpers and he stared at Oliver with watery eyes and shook his head. "No. You saved them. All of them. Before. But I… I changed the timeline."

 _I changed the timeline._ The whisper tickled across his spine like icy, jabbing fingers. Nothing good ever followed those words.

Oliver sat back and curled his fingers into a tight fist so he didn't yank Barry off of the couch and demand answers. He took a deep breath and very carefully, in the calmest voice he could manage, pushed out his burning question. "What do you mean you changed the timeline?"

Barry pulled his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. "Savitar killed Iris. The real Iris. I… I couldn't let that happen. So I ran back in time. It was just a few seconds! Just enough to move her a few inches out of his way." Barry stared blankly into space. "In the original timeline, Adrian Chase was your friend and stayed your friend. He was running around as The Vigilante. Prometheus was your friend, Tommy Merlin, and he was hopped up on blood rage from being revived in the Lazarus pit. But you were able to talk him down. He never triggered the bombs. I am _so, so_ sorry Oliver. I didn't… I didn't mean for this to happen."

A headache stronger than any Oliver had ever felt before pounding behind his eyes, making his vision shimmer and dance. A metallic taste tickled the back of his throat and nausea threatened. His hands began to tremor as adrenaline and denial flooded his body. And for a few few long moments he could think of nothing to say.

Another deep breath. Harder this time.

"You know that time travel always comes with a price. _You know that, Barry!_ Cisco's brother. John's daughter. Caitlin's powers. How could you do this?"

Barry sniffed. "I was just trying to keep Iris safe. I thought I was ready to pay the price."

"Did you bother to ask if everyone else was?!" Oliver's voice thundered through the loft.

"I wasn't thinking."

"No! You weren't!" Oliver's rage was building, white hot, burning for a target and he struggled… strained… not to release it on the collapsed, crying man in front of him. For the first time ever, he looked at Barry and absolutely wanted to destroy him, tear him from piece to piece, until nothing was left.

The silence in the loft was painfully loud, only broken up by intermittent sniffles.

"I'm sorry, Ollie."

Oliver scoffed. "You keep saying that. But you of all people should know I've never been the forgiving type."

Barry pushed up on an elbow, desperation gleaming in his eyes. "I didn't mean to hurt anybody. I just wanted to save Iris. I love her and—"

"You love her so much you traded my _sister_ , _two_ of my _best friends_ , the mother of my _child_ , the woman I thought I would _marry_ one day, and a bunch of my teammates— _your teammates_ , people who have absolutely gone to the wire, no questions asked, again and again for you—so that you could keep her a little bit longer. This is supposed to be _your_ pain, not _mine_! And now you want to be forgiven..."

Barry's shoulders drooped.

Oliver took a final deep breath and stood. "Sorry. I can't absolve you of that. The guilt you feel? You earned every drop of it."

Oliver refused to let the devastated look on Barry's face sway him. He turned and walked up the loft stairs and ducked into the upstairs bathroom before he left the first tear fall. It was joined by another and another before Oliver finally had to bite into a towel to keep his anguish from echoing in the small space.

 _You saved them all. Before._

 _I changed the timeline._

 _Your friend, Tommy Merlin._

 _I love her so much._

They should all still be here.

And William wouldn't be waking up every night, crying for his mother, while wearing Flash pajamas.

It was almost startling how quickly the sadness morphed back into burning hot anger. Oliver pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and punched in a number. It rang several times before Joe's sleepy voice came across the line.

"Hello?"

"You need to come get your son. Now. Before I hurt him. He's not welcome here anymore."


End file.
